National Awards

ACS National Award Nomination Guidelines

Eligibility Criteria

Nominators

  • Nominators are not required to be members of the Society.
  • A nomination can only have one nominator and the recommendation letter is written by this person.
  • Any individual, except a member of the award selection committee or an ACS Board member during their terms of service on the Board, may submit one nomination and/or one support letter for each award. However, selection committee members may submit other nominations or support letters for awards in which they are not serving as a judge.

Nominees

  • Nominees are not required to be members of the Society. Unless the submission is for the ACS Award for Distinguished Service in the Advancement of Inorganic Chemistry, the Kathryn C. Hach Award for Entrepreneurial Success, the Charles Lathrop Parsons Award, the Award for Volunteer Service to the ACS or the ACS Award for Team Innovation (which requires at least one ACS member in good standing).
  • The nominee’s accomplishments should be specific to the purpose of the award.
  • In general, a recipient of a widely recognized scientific award is not eligible for an ACS national award unless the accomplishment cited as the basis for the nomination represents new or different work.
  • An individual who has received an ACS National Award may be nominated for a different ACS award if (1) the nomination is for clearly different work from the previous award (the letter of recommendation for the award must address the differences between the work performed for the previous ACS award and that which is addressed in the current nomination) or (2) at least five years has elapsed since the previous ACS award was received. The “five-year” rule is waived for the preceptor(s) of the students who are eligible to receive the Nobel Laureate Signature Award for Graduate Education in Chemistry.

Rules & Guidelines

  • Nominations remain in the database for three award cycles. If the nominee is not named the recipient, the nominations will automatically rollover to the next award cycle. We do encourage nominators to access the nomination during the award cycle nomination open period July 1-November 1 of each year to update the nomination.
  • After the third award cycle, the nomination will expire. The year the award will be presented to the nominee is the award cycle year. For example, we are accepting nominations for the 2024 award cycle July 1 and the nomination deadline is November 1, 2022. The recipients of these awards will be presented the award in 2024.
  • Some awards are presented biennially (even- or odd-year) or triennially and therefore skip a year. If a nomination is submitted for a biennial award given in the even numbered years, the nomination submitted will remain in the database for the 2024, 2026, and 2028 award cycles. Also, support letters remain in the database for the same three award cycles.
  • Any National ACS Award may be rescinded by the ACS Board of Directors upon consultation with the Board Committee on Grants and Awards, or similar Board committee which has been delegated oversight responsibility for the national awards program, and upon a finding by the Board of reasonable grounds for rescission. Reasonable grounds may include, but are not limited to, a determination that (1) the award resulted from a material mistake of fact, (2) a material fact is discovered that, if known, would have disqualified the awardee, or (3) the awardee is discovered to have engaged in pre- or post-award conduct that is inconsistent with either the objects of the American Chemical Society as stated in Article II Section 1 of its Constitution or the Chemical Professional’s Code of Conduct. Such a finding may occur only after the body that made the award (if other than the Board) and the awardee have been given reasonable notice of the timing and grounds for the Board’s consideration of the rescission and an opportunity to provide written arguments against the rescission. Rescission may occur only upon an affirmative vote by at least two-thirds of the voting members of the Board present at the Board meeting duly called to consider the rescission.

Other Information

The nomination period for the ACS National Awards is July 1 to November 1.